C. S. Lewis - A Life: Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet was a very interesting book about, well as the title says, C. S. Lewis's life. It was informative but for me a little to long I liked some of it but found myself getting bored at parts.

CS Lewis: A Life was an in-depth look at CS Lewis' life and writings. I enjoyed reading about his friendship with Tolkien. The book actually spends a lot of time comparing Tolkien and Lewis, which was interesting. However, the book is pretty dry and full of more details than I cared to know. I could have enjoyed a biography of Lewis ÃÂ¼ the length of this one. This is a book for the hard-core historian.

Alister McGrath writes very well and I was certainly very engaged in the story of C S Lewis' life as it unfolded... from the beginnings to wartime for the Lewis family, his years at Oxford University and then Cambridge and his relationship with Joy Davidman. What really impressed and benefited me was to read McGrath's evaluation of the factual context in Lewis' life for the books that Lewis wrote, such as Screwtape Letters and Mere Christianity, and e.g. how his life experience affected his thinking on pain when he earlier wrote the Problem of Pain before he got married, and when he wrote A Grief Observed after he lost Joy. I really enjoyed reading the book.

This is the biography of C.S. Lewis, published for the 50th anniversary of this death in 1963. C.S. Lewis was a professor and an author of popular books such as the Narnia series.

Wow, there was a lot of information in this book, which is to be expected in a book about a person's life. While it was somewhat interesting, there are so many places, dates and people mentioned that at times it got tedious to read. Certain parts seemed repetitive, such as Lewis' conversion to Christianity, and the footnotes in the back are extensive. Other readers might find all the information fascinating, but I thought the book was just okay.

Where Lewis himself expected that he would gradually fall into oblivion, the opposite happened: Lewis and his writings seem have never been more popular than now, especially in America. The new biography by the hand of the famous British theologian Alister McGrath is a highly readable one. McGrath follows the well known history of Lewis and does so in a sympathetic and critical way: the biography certainly hasn't not become a hagiography. The person of Lewis, his development into renowned scientist, his rejection of the Christian faith of his childhood and his return to it, his thought and influence, his friendships (including the one with JRR Tolkien, for whom Lewis made a plea that the Nobel the literature should be granted to him), all this is discussed in an orderly, well-described manner. The power of Lewis' thinking, particularly his powerful explanation and defense of the Christian faith, lies in the unique combination of intellect and imagination. Those who look for a good introduction to Lewis and his thinking, will have an excellent start with McGrath's book.